Land Between Two Rivers

I grew up in Iowa and have lived most of my life in the Land Between Two Rivers and I sometimes wonder if I have actually done what I need to do to fully appreciate the place where I live.  For that matter, does anyone fully appreciate the place where they are right now?  I guess that depends on what I mean by the question.  But, let's just say that we all could probably improve in this category.

As a kid in Iowa schools, I recall that "the Land Between Two Rivers" was used frequently in various educational settings when we would talk about Iowa history and Iowa landscape.  It doesn't seem like that phrase is used as much in recent years, but it (apparently) really stuck with me.  And, given my own personal life journey, it should not be a surprise that I see much of my connection to the state as starting with the land itself.

Stuck between the Missouri River and the mighty Mississippi, Iowa actually has a satisfyingly diverse topography, if you allow yourself to explore it.  We've got the Driftless Region in the northeast and the Loess Hills in the west.  There are rivers and grasslands, swamps and woods.  

It can be difficult to get around the fact that we've decided to till most of the land and drain most of the wetlands.  It is estimated that 85% of Iowa was covered by prairie or grasslands prior to the arrival of white settlers.  Today, less than 0.1% of that prairie remains.  Our woodlands, by comparison, have made a slight rebound after hitting their lowest marks in the 1970s.  As recently as 2009, eight percent of Iowa's land was woods.  Though you could make an argument that this may have declined since that time.

Oh, and by 1930 95% of Iowa's wetlands (especially in the north central portion) had been drained so it, too, could be tilled up.  It turns out there was a reason towns like Plover and Curlew were named after waterbirds - we had a lot more acreage in wetlands for habitat.

What we see today is not what the Land Between Two Rivers had been for many centuries prior to the arrival of the Europeans.

And yet, the land still endures.  The land still has its beauty.  The land still speaks to us, if we are willing to listen.  There will be no returning it to what it once was, but perhaps we can listen to what it wants to be now.  Our well-being, the well-being of other creatures, and the health of this land - the Land Between Two Rivers, is tied to our willingness to support and recreate wild spaces throughout.  

Each of us can have a hand in turning things around.  One thing we can do is visit our natural areas and treat them with respect.  By exposing ourselves and the people we interact with to the natural world, we can remind us how valuable wild areas can be.

We can tell our elected officials that we want our state government to hire people who care for our parks and natural areas on our behalf - and fund them so they can help to educate our young people... or better yet, educate all of us to understand our land better.  

Those of us who have a plot of land in our care can plant and tend natural areas where we live and if we don't have such a space, we can be involved in supporting communal natural areas.  

And we can educate ourselves.

Some of you might remember the Iowa Public Television series called the Land Between Two Rivers.  Here is an episode on the Karst areas in northeast Iowa, which includes visits to two of our (Tammy and I) favorite places, Twin Springs and Dunning's Spring.   Don't ignore these pieces and others like it.  If you take the time to understand the land and how it works, how it was made, how it behaves... you can understand how we need to work and how we need to act when it comes to the land around us.